A system and method for transmitting a traffic indication message in a Broadband Wireless Access communication system. A base station (BS) transmits the traffic indication message to mobile subscriber stations (MSSs). The traffic indication message includes information on a number of MSS groups and information on a number of traffic indication indexes, each of the MSS groups includes a predetermined number of MSSs, and each of the traffic indication indexes is assigned to each of the MSS groups, and includes a bitmap including a predetermined number of bits. The predetermined number of bits is identical to the number of the MSSs included in each of the MSS groups, each of the predetermined number of the bits is assigned to each of the MSSs included in each of the MSS groups, and represents operation instruction information for each of the MSSs.